House Divided (190 page)

She laughed with him at the absurdity of imagining that Negroes would pay any attention to a contract. “But at least they'll work as long as you feed them, and as long as they haven't any money.”

“Well, they will if the Yankees make them,” he agreed. He meant to try it, but there was a rumor that President Johnson would presently issue an amnesty proclamation; and Brett waited to hear its terms. While he waited, the new Governor of Virginia came to Richmond. Mr. Pierpont had been a Union man, and President Lincoln had set him up last February as Governor of as much of Virginia as was held by Union armies. Now he moved his capital from Alexandria to Richmond; and Richmond men anxious to see orderly government re-established arranged a reception, and Mr. Macfarland and Mr. Haxall and Mr. Goddin were chosen to assure Mr. Pierpont that Richmond and all Virginia were prepared to work with him for the restoration of good order.

He was expected on Thursday, but his steamer was delayed till the next day; and a deluge of rain thinned the procession which to the accompaniment of a salute of thirty-six guns at Rockett's and of fifteen at Capitol Square escorted him to the Capitol. Neither Cinda nor any of the household went to witness his arrival, but the
Republic
gave a detailed account of the occasion. Governor Pierpont in his speech referred to the days when war came, and to his efforts to hold Virginia in the Union; and he said proudly:

“We did save a large part of West Virginia, and were fast embracing the eastern portion also, but those who commenced this rebellion were bent on vile, needless, cruel destruction; and the charred ruins of Richmond attest how well they accomplished their nefarious design.”

Vesta was reading the speech aloud to them. Cinda said, half amused: “I don't think we'll ever really love Mr. Pierpont, not if he talks like that!”

“Well, he was speaking to Northerners, mostly,” Vesta explained. “Or to men from Western Virginia.” She added, smiling at something she read: “The reception was very stiff and formal at first, but then they served refreshments, solid and liquid. Listen to this: ‘In a short time the best feeling and cheer prevailed in the assembly. Conspicuous among them—' I suppose because they were more intoxicated than the others. ‘Conspicuous among them were Senator Lane from Kansas, and the Honorable Mr. Norton from Illinois.' ”

“Well, let Mr. Pierpont go ahead and govern, for all of me,” Cinda commented. “I expect we'll get along in spite of him.”

And in fact Richmond every day seemed to draw nearer to normal ways. Sometimes she thought the process too rapid. There was a May Festival out on Church Hill, in which a number of young ladies took part, and Miss Julia Picot was named Queen of the Festival and there were refreshments afterward at Mrs. Parkinson's home; and the band and the glee club of the Twenty-Fourth Massachusetts regiment provided music for the occasion. “But it's curious.” Cinda spoke in a sarcastic tone. “It's curious that we don't know any of the young ladies who took part; at least none of those whose names are in the paper.”

Yet the Yankees were certainly trying to restore good order. The idle Negroes were the greatest problem. General Patrick, the Provost Marshal, addressed a mass meeting at the African Church and urged them all to leave Richmond and return to the farms and go to work, or to find jobs in the city; but Brett said next day:

“If any of them took his advice it doesn't show! There must be thirty or forty thousand of them still here.”

The soldiers patrolling the streets became increasingly stern in smothering any disturbance. When a battle of sticks and stones and fists broke out on Fifteenth Street between Negroes on one side and
worthless white men on the other, scores of combatants were hustled away to prison. There were still many thefts and robberies and even burglaries, but a hundred or more of the prisoners released from Castle Thunder during the fire were still at large; so not all those crimes could be blamed on the Negroes.

 

On the last Monday in May—the day the slander that President Davis wore woman's clothes in trying to escape his captors was admitted by the Yankees to have been a lie—Trav and Enid came from Lynchburg. They travelled by the Central, since not for another ten days would the Danville road be ready to renew operations. When they reached the house, Brett had gone to investigate a report that President Johnson had at last issued the proclamation of amnesty; but Cinda and the others were at home, and to see Trav again was great happiness. Cinda laughed at her own tears. “I declare, Travis, I don't know why I should be sniffling; but you always were my favorite brother.”

Her gladness embraced Enid, too; but she thought that even in the short weeks since they last saw each other, Enid had grown older. There were lines at the corners of her eyes, and something bruised and hopeless in her expression. Cinda felt a sympathy for her which she had rarely felt before. Enid was so much younger than Travis; and no matter how dearly you loved him, Travis had never any gaiety in him, nor any youthfulness. She decided Enid was overtired, and took her away upstairs and bade June bring supper to her there; and she stayed while Enid undressed and made herself comfortable, asking her many questions. Lucy? Peter?

Lucy was grown up, Enid told her, trying to smile. “She makes me feel like an old woman, she's so much the young lady. I know now how Mama must have felt, with me for a grown daughter when she was no older than I am now.” Lucy even had a beau, a most devoted beau. “Tom Buford. He was in one of those terrible Yankee prisons, at Elmira in New York State. He's only just come home. They starved him till some of his teeth actually fell out. He says thousands of our soldiers died there, of smallpox or pneumonia, or from not having enough to eat.”

“I know. In the hospital I used to see our men come home so nearly starved that they just died.”

“I wish the Yankees would get into a war with someone else, so we could fight against them and get even for all the things they did to us!”

“A good many Northerners died in our prisons, too.”

Enid nodded. “I guess so. Trav says our prison at Salisbury was terrible. It was so crowded that lots of the prisoners had to dig caves to live in, or crawl under the buildings, even in the winter; and they all had pneumonia or dysentery or something, and they never got enough to eat.”

“I always supposed there was plenty of food in that part of North Carolina.”

“Well, there's plenty of it up North, too; but the Yankees starved our men!” Enid's tone was defiant. “So naturally we starved theirs! Trav says as many as fifty died sometimes in a day, at Salisbury. The carts would haul them away, piled up like logs. If they had any clothes on when they died, somebody stripped them. They hauled the bodies out and dumped them in a gully and sometimes didn't bother to throw any dirt over them. Trav says even Salisbury people thought it was terrible to treat them so; but it certainly was no worse than what the Yankees did to our boys. Like Tom Buford.”

Cinda said sadly: “I think if people would remember the awful things in war—the things both sides do—there wouldn't be any more wars, ever.”

She asked how the Longstreets were; and Enid said Mrs. Longstreet was about to have another baby. “Any day now. The General's as proud as if it was their first.” She added: “He and Judge Garland have terrible arguments.”

“What about?”

“Oh, about what we ought to do, now the war's over. General Longstreet thinks we ought to be good little boys!” Enid's tone was scornful. “For once, even Trav disagrees with him.”

“General Lee says the same thing,” Cinda suggested.

“Oh, I suppose they all have to say it; but General Longstreet seems really to believe it.”

“Is he afraid of being arrested?”

“No, he says General Grant won't let any paroled men be bothered as long as they behave themselves.”

Cinda presently heard Brett's voice belowstairs, and she left Enid to sleep. “Get a good night's rest, dear,” she said affectionately. “Sleep as late as you can.”

Jenny and Vesta were putting the children to bed, so she found Brett and Trav alone; and Brett had news.

“Burr and Mr. Pierce just arrived, Cinda. I saw them at the Spottswood. Burr's coming right up, as soon as they're settled.” Cinda, quick with happiness, declared they must both come here; but Brett said Mr. Pierce was worn out by the trip. “And Burr promised Barbara to take care of him.” Poor Burr was so gentle and so kind that he would always let Barbara impose on him. “Mr. Pierce wants to move back to Richmond,” Brett explained. “He's come house hunting. He'll find prices pretty high. Houses couldn't cost more if there were a gold mine on every lot.”

Trav said: “I'd sell the Clay Street house back to him.” Cinda looked at him in surprise, and he explained: “That's why I came to Richmond, to sell the house.”

“But, Travis, where will you live?”

“We're going back to Chimneys. I've been down there.” Cinda thought it must have been on his way that he heard those hideous tales of the horror of Salisbury. “Mr. Fiddler, my old overseer, is there.” Trav spoke to Brett. “He was with Hood in Tennessee, in the fighting at Franklin; but he's all right, and Pegleg has kept the people together, kept them working.”

“Have you told Enid, Travis?” If he had, this might explain Enid's haggard eyes, her look of despair; for Enid had been wretched at Chimneys.

“Yes.”

“She was never happy there.”

He said in hard tones: “We're going back.” Cinda knew nothing would shake him. Enid might batter as she chose against the stone wall of his decision and get only bruises for her pains.

“There must be bushwhackers in the mountains around there,” Brett suggested. “Is it safe?” Cinda suspected that he too felt sympathy for Enid.

“They won't bother us,” Trav said positively. “A man named Alex Spain led a band that made the Martinston region their headquarters; but he lives near there and his men too, and now they've gone back to farming and they're really a protection. They chased one gang clear back to Tennessee, killed two of them and caught another and strung him up to a beam in his own barn; and they helped round up the Wade gang, up near Holman's Ford on the Yadkin; gave four of them a trial and shot them. No, we won't be bothered at Chimneys.” He added: “The wheat's badly rusted, and rains have beaten it down, so we can't hope for much of a crop; but I made some money trading in tobacco, so we'll be all right till next year's crop comes in.”

Brett said approvingly: “Well! You're the business man of the family, Trav. I've nothing left except a reputation.”

“I can help you. I sold my tobacco for almost five thousand dollars —in greenbacks—and when I sell the house——”

“You can't sell the house,” Brett told him. “Not under the terms of the amnesty proclamation.” Cinda had been only half listening, waiting for Burr's step at the door; but she forgot Burr now as Brett explained: “We're excluded from amnesty; all general officers and public officials, and every one worth twenty thousand dollars who voluntarily aided the Confederacy. So you and I can't sell anything.”

Cinda protested. “Why not, for Heaven's sake?”

“Because we're outlaws! Everything we have is liable to confiscation, so we can't give good tide to anything we—think we own.”

“You mean to say they can take our house?”

“Well, they took Senator Semmes's house in New Orleans, and a lot of plantations in Louisiana.” Brett looked at Trav. “Sold them, or leased them to free negroes, in forty acre lots.”

“That's the most outrageous—” Cinda began, but then here was Burr; and in the bliss of holding him again in her arms, every trouble was for a while forgotten. He was thin, but he was alive and well after years of deadly danger; and he was here! Now for a while at least she need not share him with Barbara. She was sorry even to share him with Vesta and Jenny, who when they heard her call his name came running down the stairs; and she was furious when after half an hour Burr said he must go back to Mr. Pierce.

“He's nervous, and he gets excited,” he explained. “I left him asleep, but he wakes up and worries.”

“Worries? What has he to worry about?”

Burr grinned in an embarrassed way. “Oh he's got into the. habit.” And he said, like a confession: “You see, he put everything he had into gold and buried it in the cellar; and he worried about that. Of course by the time Sherman got to Raleigh the war was as good as over, so Sherman kept his men on their good behavior, didn't let them bother anyone.”

Cinda thought spitefully that it would have served Mr. Pierce right if Sherman's thieves had stolen his miserly hoard. Anyone who had saved anything out of the past ought to be ashamed of himself! She said in dry contempt: “Why, wasn't Mr. Pierce clever? Brett was so stupid. He put all our money into Confederate bonds, so of course we're just paupers now!”

Brett said in a tone he seldom used to her: “Cinda!”

She bit her lip, and Burr tried to laugh. “It's all right, Papa! I know the way Mama talks.” He kissed Cinda and she clung to him as though she would never let him go.

 

When Burr left, and Vesta and Jenny had gone upstairs, Cinda stayed with Brett and Trav, listening to their talk together. Brett, as soon as the cars were running to Danville, would start for the Plains. “Beyond Greensboro, I'll have to travel any way I can, but I'll get there.” He meant to contract with the Negroes who had been his slaves. “The price of cotton won't break much this year, and Jenny says they baled last year's crop and hid it in the woods, and she's sure Sherman's men wouldn't find it. If I can get it to Charleston and ship it to New York, I ought to get fifty or seventy-five cents the pound.”

“The railroads can't carry it, can they?”